


It takes more than Tinsel to keep you warm

by ermengarde



Category: Bandom, My Chemical Romance
Genre: Christmas, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-25
Updated: 2019-12-25
Packaged: 2021-02-26 01:34:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,489
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21945199
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ermengarde/pseuds/ermengarde
Summary: For the prompt: Gerard/Ray, holiday preparations
Relationships: Ray Toro/Gerard Way
Comments: 8
Kudos: 34
Collections: 6 Degrees of Pete Wentz - December 2019





	It takes more than Tinsel to keep you warm

**Author's Note:**

  * For [thriceandonce (sylvaine)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sylvaine/gifts).



> Note that whilst no archive warnings apply, there is mention of a parent having a slightly hard time with their own feelings about their child coming out to them. There's never any doubt that there's love there, the PoV is the child's, but if that's something that you find difficult, this may not be the best story for you. 
> 
> For those that have or are still struggling with familial acceptance of who they are, all the love to you <3.

Gerard's apartment should basically be condemned, Ray thinks. The lights on the stairs are always broken, the heat's so completely pathetic that Gerard's had to resort to using the ancient fireplace, and that mostly results in the whole place being filled with smoke. He gets that it's cheap and close to Gee's work, but it's _so_ bad. It makes Ray feel a little sick to think of Gerard spending Christmas here, trying to cook dinner on his hotplate and hoping that the power doesn't short out because he's trying to actually _use_ it.

Ray still lives at home and commutes for 900 hours every day, and he won't even _see_ Gerard on Christmas because Gee's working so late that all of the transportation out to the boondocks will be off for the Holiday and Gee totally vetoed Ray's suggestion that he stay with Gerard because Gerard didn't want to ruin Ray's holiday too. 

It fucking sucks and thinking about it too hard makes Ray's throat hurt. 

He talks it over with his Dad on Thanksgiving - another fucking holiday that Gerard spends camping in his shithole apartment alone - and his Dad pats him on the arm and looks sympathetic and that makes Ray choke up... He's always known that his Dad loves him but they'd had kind of a difficult time when Ray came out, and his dad still gets kind of squirrely when Ray talks about Gee.It's not that his dad doesn't _want_ to be supportive or whatever, but he's not really down with the PFLAG crowd or whatever but Ray knows he's _trying_ and that's important, and it matters, even when it hurts sometimes. 

"Uh. You know your Aunt Sophia has a place up in the city?" Ray's dad asks, staring at the game on the TV, not looking at Ray at all. He said it quietly, though, and none of his brothers seem to have heard, o Ray figures his dad's probably talking to him. 

"Um." Ray sort of remembers, he thinks. Aunt Sophia is about 100 years old, and she's in an assisted living facility on the other side of the city, but they'd never visited her much even before she moved. She found all Ray's brothers, and Ray, to be kind of overwhelming (or too fucking loud, Ray remembers his dad saying when he was about 6. He remembers his mom getting super mad about the language, too.) "Yeah, kinda I think?"

"You were there, about twice I reckon, up until you started running around like a hoodlum and she started worrying about her china." Ray's dad chuckles. "She liked you, though, thought you were pretty well mannered for little boy.." Ray's dad takes a long slug of his beer. "I reckon I could maybe talk her into letting you.... you and Gerard, maybe, rent her apartment, now she's got her precious plates and cups over at the facility with her. I know she hates that it's empty, and she really doesn't want to sell."

"You... you'd do that?"

Ray's dad finally turns and looks at him. "Sure, you're my son, I want you happy, and I figure that Gerard makes you happy, and he seems to be a good person... and I just." His dad bites his top lip.. "I'd do this if he was a girl.." He turns back towards the game.

"Thanks dad." Ray has to swallow, hard, to stop the tears. 

Aunt Sophia demands that Ray visits with her, and that he brings a picture of his special boy with him. Rays dad goes scarlet when he passes on her message and he refuses to go with Ray to the facility. He does give Ray a huge sweeping bear hug though, so Ray knows his dad's still working on it. 

The facility is heated to about a million degrees and it smells of over cooked vegetables and fake flowers. It looks clean though, and the woman at the desk where he signs in tells him Sophia is expecting him and tells him which way to go. Sophia's room is at the end of a corridor, and she's sitting in a chair looking out of the window over a park full of people, she's so tiny, Ray feels oversized and clumsy next to her. 

"Hello Raymond." Her voice is surprisingly strong, and there's something about her that makes Ray want to hand in his math homework.

"Hello Aunt Sophia, how are you?"

"Ah, there are the manners." She smiles at him. "Come and sit down and tell me about this boy you're going to live with in my apartment. When is the wedding?"

"Uhh." Ray kind of stutters. "Wedd..?"

"I saw, you can get married now, yes?" 

Ray sinks into his seat. ".... yes... " He says in a very small voice. 

"Good. In my day all the boys, they had to live in sin, and it made the hospitals and things very difficult. Married is better."

"I....." This is absolutely not the conversation that Ray thought they would be having, and he feels like his feet have been pulled right from under him. 

Sophia smiles at him. "You move into my place, you propose, you get married and I give it to you as a wedding present." She nods, decisively. "It's hard for you young people to get a good start, I've got far more than I'm going to be able to use in the time I've got left and you remind me of so many of my kind boys. Yes. This is what we'll do. Now, I think you should have a summer wedding, I don't do so well outside in the cold and I would like to come."

"I. Um. I don't even know if he'll say..." Ray gestures weakly. Married? Fuck. Like, when he's thought about the future it's always had Gee in it, and they've been together for a couple of years - their permanence is why Ray came out to his folks - but they're both poorer than dirt, and....

"Of course he'll say yes, look at you, my strong handsome great nephew. You're a catch." Sophia pats him on the knee.

Ray stays at the facility until they throw him out because it's dinner time. Sophia makes him escort her along to the dining room. He heads straight to Gee's after that, feeling like he's drunk too much coffee or eaten too much sugar, or...something. He feels like he did the day he went home to tell his parents he was in love with a boy.

Gerard's place is dark and cold, but Gerard's grin is bright and warm when he opens the door to his apartment. "Ray! Hey! How was your Aunt?" When he puts his arms around Ray, Ray can feel how chilled Gerard is.

"Umm. She wasn't what I expected. At all." Ray rubs his hands up and down Gee's back, trying to chafe some heat into him. "I, um." Ray lets Gerard go and takes a half step back. "So, she's offered us her apartment, rent controlled. We can move in before Christmas, get it ready for the holidays, celebrate properly, together."

Gerard's eyes get very big. "Us?"

Ray nods. "Yeah." He bites his lip. "She, uh, she said we should get married." His heart is in his mouth, and he's breathing too fast. He can't take his eyes off Gerard's face. "Is that something..."

Gerard smiles, soft and quiet. "Yeah. I mean if... like." He gestures at Ray. "if you... not just her...." Gerard is worrying his hands together. 

Ray feels a laugh bubble out of his chest. "Yeah. It's something I want, too, I just.... I didn't know I was allowed to."

Gerard kisses him, hard, messy and full of love.

The china might be out of Sophia's place, but all of her furniture's still there - Ray figures it's probably just as well, or they'd be sitting on the floor, but he draws the line at sleeping on her mattress. His dad helps him bring his mattress up from home, and he also helps Gerard put up some hooks for his all of his art. It might be the happiest day of Ray's life, seeing Gee and his dad just, like, _being_ in the same space, discussing the merits of drywall anchors and self-plugging screws.

It gets even better when Gerard finds an ancient silver christmas tree, slightly tarnished with age, packed in a box with some amazing mid-century decorations. Ray's dad insists on getting them new tree lights, so they don't burn themselves to death, and when Gerard finishes up the place looks so special and Christmasy, and home.

Ray's heart is full, and while transportation might not run out to get him or Gerard back to their folk's on Christmas, it is running out to Sophia's facility, so after a gentle morning, celebrating each other, they go out to visit her, so she can welcome Gee into the family.


End file.
